Towards clinical grating-interferometry mammography

Breast cancer is by far the most frequent cancer among women and constitute a major health problem and a large public burden. The current gold standard for early breast cancer screening and diagnosis is X-ray mammography, however, due to the low absorption nature of breast tissue to X-rays, its sensitivity and specificity are not satisfying.  Grating interferometry is a promising technology to improve the current methods by providing sensitive and complementary contrast mechanisms, such as phase contrast and dark-field contrast. In collaboration with Philips Research Hamburg, Kantonsspital Baden and Universitätspital Zurich, the team of X-ray tomography group has developed the word-first clinical grating-interferometry mammography system.  The system is powered by a dedicated grating interferometer equipped with in-house developed X-ray gratings and is fully compatible with clinical standards.  First mastectomy images have been acquired with clinical dose and exposure time. To date, the prototype is installed at Universitätspital Zurich for clinical trial.